Giant is a film as big as its title. Bigger, probably. The movie runs about three hours, and it takes that long to tell the stories of the Benedicts, specifically the (short) courtship and (long) marriage of Leslie and Jordan, played superbly by Rock Hudson and Elizabeth Taylor.

I could go on and on about this movie, but really it needs to be viewed. There are several stories and/or themes, but the main one is prejudice, especially racial and class. Director George Stevens also directed A Place in the Sun, another movie I admire. His direction is precise, his actors' performances complex, and he is inventive but always focused on what improves the story telling.

Lots of pictures, below, and yet not nearly enough.

Rock Hudson. I never really appreciated his craftsmanship before.

Elizabeth Taylor. She--that is, her character--is somewhat heroic and definitely admirable. Leslie Benedict has her own mind, and is determined to use it. Taylor is charming and...what's the right word?...

If this wasn't filmed it Texas, it might as well have been. As I always say, there's simply more sky there.

Jane Withers has a small role, but this scene made me teary with its simple subtley. She was clearly in love with Hudson's character, and disappointed that he married (so suddenly, too). Taylor's gracious response made me love her character for the next two and three quarter hours.

Beef!

Mercedes McCambridge, making the most of her short screen time. Excellent!

It's hard to praise James Dean's performance enough. Here's a guy who mumbles half his lines--and is perfectly in character.

Perfection.

That, my friends, is one big animal.

James Dean, aged to about 40.

Sal Mineo, who appeared with Dean in Rebel Without a Cause

Likewise in Rebel, who's this handsome man? Dennis Hopper, of course!

The disk I received for High Noon (1952) wasn't in good shape. It played fine in my stand alone unit, but not in the computer I use for capturing images. Still, I was able to get good shots, and I've included plenty of them. I recognized lots of actors! (The only actor I didn't include was Lon Chaney, Jr.. Not because he didn't give a good performance. Maybe because I was disappointed; for a second I thought he was his father (he was billed only as Lon Chaney). For all of Mr. Chaney, Jr.'s fans, forgive me.

From the beginning, the film gripped me with its feeling of menace and conflict. The famous ballad that plays repeatedly--yet, somehow, not repetitively--adds to the immediate sense of danger. Gary Cooper delivers a complex performance. I found his line delivery surprisingly flat, but most of his time on screen involves showing his inner fear, sincerity, and mounting desperation. He has to show all these, and more, within the contex of the strong, granite lawman. It's as if you had to paint a rainbow, but could only use four colors. Cooper's acting is a marvel of restraint. By the end, he is at once completely human, and completely a larger than life hero.

A marshal hangs up his badge and prepares to leave town with his new bride when he learns a killer he put in jail five years earlier is returning by train, along with three other members of his gang. The train arrives in an hour and a half--high noon--and the marshal tries to rally the reluctant and cowardly town to his aid. That's the setup. The movie is effectively in real time. This is not an adventure. It is a morality play and study in human behavior. It's a love story, too. And, it's a story that touches on the paradoxes of morality and integrity. If written four hundred years ago, it would have been Shakespeare.

(Read more about this film being an allegory against Hollywood blacklisting on its Internet Movie Database trivia page.)

No one was cooler than Lee Van Cleef. In fact, he became more cool with age (see Escape From New York).

A young Lloyd Bridges. The resemblence of father to son Jeff Bridges is remarkable.

Harry Morgan, who went on to fame as Col. Potter in M*A*S*H.

The impossibly beautiful, talented...adjectives fail me...Grace Kelly.

The ever-excellent and dependable Thomas Mitchell.

Grace Kelly and the equally beautiful Katy Jurado.

Gary Cooper, facing his future.

Time to catch up on links. I've got a barrel full!

First up is this fun little site. Here are my web sites in graphic form. Aren't they precious?
Websites as Graphics

FlattLand

Creative Writing

Software Meadows

Let me also single out The Baby Name Wizard. It's a lovely application, great fun. Here's my question for anyone to answer. Why did the names Michael and Madison suddenly spike in usage?

Video

Warning: Sexually Explicit (and very funny!)
Light Saber Dildos

Colin Machrie has absolutely no fear. Richard Simmons is hillarious. The other guys can barely stand by the end.
Funniest "Whose Line Is It Anyway?" Ever

Wayne Brady and Josie Lawrence. The audience goes into an astonished hush when they do their Gilbert and Sullivan. Improvisational genius!
Whose Line: Wayne Brady and Josie Lawrence

Cows With Guns
Wiliam Shatner: Rocket Man
Stewie Griffin: Rocket Man
Evolution of Dance
Hello, Captain?

Weird

Apparently his girlfriend wasn't nearly as crazy as he was.
Man guilty of trying to get wife, girlfriend killed

News

Dan Quayle walks out of Mellencamp concert
Outer-space sex carries complications
Dungeon girl lived on bread and cheese

I don't in any way have sympathy for sex offenders, but I certainly don't think they should be tracked like this after serving their sentence. Why not a database for all convicted criminals? Don't I have the right (I ask ironically) to know if someone in my neighborhood was convicted of theft? Murder? Extortion? Drug trafficking? Fraud? And therefore, shouldn't we require all convicted criminals of any crime to register there whereabouts whereever they go? I have serious civil liberty concerns about this. If the offender must register his movements, then he's not considered a safe citizen, and if not, why has he been released? I know there's more to the issue than that, but it still strikes me as a dangerous--and exclusionary--law.
Congress moves to create sex offender database

Cool

X-rays reveal Archimedes' hidden writings
Angry Face
Scientists look at worms for 'wine nose'
The parable of the beer and diapers
New source of replacement brain cells found
Oddballs abound when you're a freak magnet
Separated a Birth? Neurons and galaxy photos
Trap-jaw ant has world's fastest bite
Elephants do run, study concludesCosmic collision reveals dark matter
Cows also 'have regional accents'
Gene therapy transforms cells into tumor killers
Humans strange, Neanderthals normal
Ultra-precise atomic clocks will redefine time
Subatomic Scare Tactics
Optical Illusions Etc.

Not exactly science...
Phone telepathy: You knew it was true

This is interesting...especially the quote "The Sun...traverses...on the spring and vernal equinoxes." Um, vernal means spring. They should have said "vernal and autumnal equinoxes".
Mysteries of the equator

No Place Else

2005's 10 Best "Conservative" Movies: An Ironic Rebuttal
Dogs May Laugh, but Only Cats Get the Joke
Omnipelagos.com: meandering search engine
Cooking By Numbers
Insutingly Stupid Movie Physics

Technology

I saved this for the first statistic. One percent, yikes!
Does your PC have a good rep?

John Dvorak showing he doesn't know what he's talking about. Sometimes he does, sometimes he doesn't....
Why CSS Bugs Me

John Dvorak making some sense. Maybe.
Microsoft Needs a "Code Pope"

The Science Fiction Files
Study: Technology is a girl's best friend new=false
The Hard Disk That Changed the World

Absurd
Google wants people to stop googling

Using Thunderbird to Get Things Done
Love all for instant replay at U.S. Open